For some hours we held on without difficulty. It became very hot. The
sun's rays poured down into the close, shut-in kloofs as from the lens
of a gigantic burning-glass; and the atmosphere was unmoved by a single
puff of wind. The horses were in a bath of perspiration, and it became
evident they must be off-saddled, wherefore a halt was called in a cool,
shady place, where they could enjoy to the full a much-needed rest. It
was a bushy secluded spot beneath an overhanging cliff, from whose face
a whole cloud of spreuws flashed hither and thither, whistling in lively
alarm, but, best of all, it contained a cool clear water-hole, albeit
the liquid was slightly brackish.
"Tired, Holt?" asked Brian good-naturedly, as having knee-haltered the
horses, we were discussing some supplies which had been brought in a
saddle-bag. "Have a drop of grog."
"To the first I answer `No,' to the second, `Yes,' emphatically!" I
said, catching the flask which he chucked across to me. It was a roomy
metal one, with considerable carrying capacity.
"Well, this sort of forced march on an African summer day isn't a cool
and invigorating promenade," cut in Trask. "After you, Holt."
We had a tot all round and a smoke. Then it became time to move on
again. Once a check occurred, where the thieves had manifestly
separated their spoil, but the device was only a blind, and soon solved
by such experienced frontiersmen as Brian and Revell. Now and again we
would sight a farmhouse, with its cultivated strip of mealie land,
picturesquely nestling in some bushy hollow, but such we purposely
avoided, for news travels on winged feet among Kafirs, and the arrival
of an armed party at one of these homesteads would be extremely likely
to be notified by any of the hangers-on there to their brethren of the
marauding clans inhabiting the dark, frowning fastnesses which now began
to rise not far in front. Nor was there any need to ask for
information, for the spoor was as plain as plain could be, and soon,
after leading us up a steep hillside, it suddenly left the bush, and,
cresting the ridge, struck out into an open plain, where, a few hundred
yards in front stood a large native kraal, the dark forms of whose
inhabitants we could see moving about among the beehive-shaped huts.
But the simultaneous yell and rush of a lot of curs promptly turned the
attention of the said inhabitants upon us. It looked as if our
appearance had been provocative of more than ordinary excitement.
"Don't shoot, Trask," said Brian warningly, observing that that worthy
was aiming at a couple of large, mouthing curs whom he considered in
rather too close proximity to his horse's hocks. "Don't shoot. We
haven't time to stop and have a row here."
"Who is your headman?" he asked the half-dozen sullen, stalwart savages
who had slouched forward to meet us.
"He is not here, _Umlungu_," was the ready reply.
"_Who_ is he, not _where_ is he?" repeated Brian.
"He is away," again answered the man, a tall, grizzled Kafir with an
evil expression of countenance.
"Now look," said Brian forcibly. "When did those oxen and horses pass
by here? The spoor is at your very doors. One of you must go with us
and carry it on, or you are responsible equally with the thieves."
By this time quite a number of Kafirs had come forth from among the huts
by twos and threes, and were clustering around, a proportion armed with
tough, heavy kerries, and their demeanour was sullen and unfriendly to a
degree, as they muttered among themselves in their deep bass tones.
Women, too, had raised their greasy, scantily-clad forms where they had
been lolling against the huts basking in the sun with their
round-headed, beady-eyed brats, and were gazing at us; the while
discussing us with the freedom of their sex and in no flattering terms.
"_Au_! We know nothing about thieves, _Umlungu_," replied the
spokesman. "If any oxen came by here they did not stay here. Why not
follow them further if you have followed them so far? Why trouble us?"
And a great jeering guffaw greeted the words.
"Good," said Brian. "These oxen have been stolen, and we have traced
them to the gates of your kraal. You will hear a great deal more about
this."
"_Whau_!" exclaimed the savage, turning his back upon us. "Go. Go and
find your oxen."
Again that insolent jeering laugh went up from the onlookers, and here
an unpleasant discovery forced itself upon us. By accident or design,
the crowd, which was now considerable, had closed round us on every
side. A serried mass of dark, musky bodies, and grim--and it seemed
threatening--faces walled us in, while requests for tobacco and other
things were hurled at us in tones that savoured more of demand than
petition. The aim of the savages was clear. They intended to delay our
advance as long as possible. We had, rather foolishly, allowed
ourselves to be led into a trap.
Then occurred the unexpected. A tall Kafir, in the forefront of the
mob, pointing suddenly at Revell, ejaculated in great jeering tone--
"_Hau! Ibomvu_!"
And the shout ran through the whole crowd.
"_Ibomvu_!" roared the men. "_Yau_! _Ibomvu_!" shrilled the women in
the background.
I have said something as to the effect produced upon our comrade by any
allusion to his flaming poll. It seemed to drive him quite mad. It
mattered not that it was uttered by one man or a thousand, the effect
upon him was just the same, and this held good here. In less than a
second he had put his horse straight at the original offender, and with
a tough seacow-hide sjambok which dangled from his wrist was cutting
into that astonished and ill-advised ruffian with the fury of a madman.
On head and face and naked shoulders the terrible lash descended, and
the lightning-like celerity of the attack was such as to leave neither
time nor thought for resistance--the victim's one idea--if he had even
one--being to escape from that awful lash, while those around, appalled
by the white, infuriated countenance, and the frenzied plunging of the
horse, gave way, though not before several of them had tasted the
infliction; for Revell cut impartially right and left as though he were
hewing his way through with a sabre. And in effect this is just what he
might have been doing, for the crowd on that side opened out in wildest
confusion, of which we took advantage, and in less than a minute were a
couple of hundred yards from the spot.
And now a terrific hubbub arose in our rear. A glance over our
shoulders showed the crowd roaring forward on our track, while among
others who had dived into the huts to arm, we could see the bright gleam
of assegais.
"Face round," cried Brian, "and aim, but for your lives don't fire. If
we can't scare them to a halt we must turn and run. But--no shooting."
We wrenched our horses round. The roaring, surging rush of oncoming
savages poured forward, then stopped. Four gun barrels sending forth
their contents into the thick of the mob would create awful havoc, and
there were four more in reserve, for we each had double barrels.
Besides, they knew we could gallop out of reach at no loss to ourselves.
So they halted, brandishing sticks and assegais, and howling out every
kind of taunting and abusive epithet.
"_Ibomvu_! _Yau_! _Ibomvu_!" yelled Revell, in return, making his
sjambok whistle through the air as he flourished it round his head.
"Come on, all of you, and taste this. I'll cut the whole lot of you to
thongs! I'll show you how _Ibomvu_ can burn!"
This speech, in Kafir, raised another roar of menace and defiance, but
the savages were not inclined to accept the invitation therein embodied,
wherefore we turned our horses' heads, and proceeded leisurely onward.
"Go on, go on," howled the mob after us. "Go and find your oxen!
They--up yonder--will know how to talk with you."
No further interruption occurred, and before us lay the tell-tale track,
as clear as need be. At length the wooded heights rose immediately in
front, and we halted for another short off-saddle.
"Now look here," began Brian, throwing himself on the ground, and
filling his pipe. "It's evident these chaps don't care whether we
follow them or not, but I believe we shall come up with them this
evening, and we shall have a little over three hours of daylight to do
it in. The sort of treatment we met with just now is a good earnest of
what we've got to expect. And there are only four of us."
"Hooray for a row!" cried Trask.
"Yes, but we don't want a row if it can possibly be avoided. We're
between the devil and the deep sea, which for present purposes may be
taken to mean that none of us must fire a shot unless our lives depend
upon it, and then, if possible, fire blank."
This oration was interrupted, and that by a thud of approaching hoof
strokes and a sound of deep voices and laughter. A track wound round
the hillside lower down, and we saw about a score of mounted Kafirs
sweep past, chattering and laughing at the top of their voices. It was
clear that this gang was returning from a visit to some canteen, for the
condition of more than one of their number was not a little precarious,
swaying and lurching in their ragged saddles as they belaboured their
wretched undersized steeds.
"All as drunk as pigs," whispered Revell. "By George! That looks like
Kuliso."
A tall, finely-made man, clad in an ancient pair of trousers and a red
blanket and wearing an ivory ring on his left arm rode at the head of
the gang, evidently a chief, for he was rather more drunk than the rest,
and seemed to occupy a greater share of attention.
"No, it isn't," returned Brian. "I don't know who it is, though." And
in a trice the weird equestrians, their red blankets streaming behind
them, were whirled out of sight, and having given them time to get
further on their way, we resumed our own.
There was nothing in itself gloomy or forbidding in the series of
densely-wooded heights which now rose in front of us. Peaceful solitude
rather than lurking danger was the idea conveyed by that winding
succession of deep valleys and lofty hills slumbering in the golden
light of the waning afternoon, yet the network of rugged ravines we were
about to penetrate had, in former times, been the scene of more than one
bloody encounter wherein the advantages had all lain with the wild
denizens of the place. Many a dark episode could those tangled glens
have told, of patrols surprised and outnumbered in the thick bush, of
brave men struck down by the assegai of the savage, or dragged off,
wounded and disabled, to be put to a lingering death of torture. Even
at that time the locality held an evil repute as the haunt of cattle
thieves and desperate characters generally.
We crossed a kind of deep basin shut in on all sides by wooded hills,
then through a narrow _poort_ overhung by aloe-fringed krantzes widening
out into just such another basin. In fact, we seemed to have got into a
veritable labyrinth of such--and through my own mind, at any rate,
passed the thought--How were we going to get out? Then the clamour of
dogs in front, and we suddenly came upon a kraal.
"Straight on," said Brian. "We can't stop. No time to waste."
The inhabitants gave us rather a sullen greeting, but made no
demonstration, staring after us in lowering silence. And now the way
became wilder and more rugged still, and the spoor, yet plain as ever,
led us far down into a jungly glade, where the monkey ladders hung like
trellis work from the twisted limbs of great yellow-wood trees, and here
in the shaded gloom of the forest--for this was no mere scrub, but real
forest--night seemed already to be drawing in.
"What's this?" said Brian, turning in his saddle to look back, as a long
shrill cry arose in the distance, from the direction of the kraal we had
left behind us.
"I hope they are not raising the country on our heels."
We paused and listened. The sound was repeated, far away behind us.
"Well, we must take our chance. `Push on' is the word."
For some time we rode on in silence, over the same sort of ground as I
have already described. And now the sky was glowing with blades of
golden effulgence, as the rays of the declining sun lengthened, touching
for a moment the face of a great iron-bound krantz starting up, here and
there, from the dark impenetrable bush. A pair of crimson-winged louris
darted across our path, but otherwise sign of life was there none.
Somehow we felt that we must be very close upon the marauders, who might
number ten or a hundred. Every moment had become one of tense
excitement and expectation.